Tom Brady looked at no one, spoke to no one, nodded at no one as he stalked toward the New England Patriots’ locker room early Sunday morning. One fan said, “Go, Blue,” referring to Brady’s alma mater, Michigan. Nothing. Another said, “Go, Browns.” Not even a chuckle. Brady’s suspension for his role in a scheme to deflate footballs ended last week, but his fury lingers. He loves playing, and he had four games taken from him. He loves being with his team-mates, and he had four weeks of camaraderie, of teaching and learning, taken from him.
He simmered. He seethed. He fought to overturn his punishment and lost, and now the rest of the NFL will incur his wrath. Brady’s prey Sunday were the winless Cleveland Browns, and he shredded their defence on New England’s first series – and second, third and fourth, too.
On this sunny afternoon, when Brady threw for 406 yards and three touchdowns in his return from exile, the final score was immaterial – except in one sense. The margin of New England’s 33-13 victory illuminated just how much the Patriots had missed Brady, regardless of how they had fared in his absence.
Suspension
Brady inherited a team that went 3-1 during his suspension, and that success fueled a perception that he, to some degree, was a product of coach Bill Belichick’s genius, and that quarterbacks were interchangeable within an organisational machinery that squeezed multiple victories from a backup, Jimmy Garoppolo, and a third-string rookie, Jacoby Brissett.
Under Brady, though, the offense gained more yards in the first half on Sunday – 321 – than it did in all of last week’s game, a shutout loss to Buffalo. Brady maximised Rob Gronkowski’s coverage mismatches to facilitate yards after receptions. He took advantage of New England’s two-tight-end sets, connecting with Martellus Bennett for three touchdowns. He tormented the Browns with short, precise passes and then tormented them with long, precise passes, like the 43-yarder to Chris Hogan that led to the Patriots’ third touchdown.
“I mean, it’s Tom Brady, so you don’t expect anything less,” receiver Julian Edelman said. Gronkowski, asked if he thought Brady had seemed at all out of sync, volleyed the question back at the reporter. When he was told “no”, Gronkowski smiled. “Me, neither,” he said.
Brady, now in his 17th season, has expressed a desire to play into his 40s and burnish his legacy – which may or may not have been tarnished by his nasty dispute with the NFL. “This isn’t the time for me to reflect,” Brady said. Later, when asked about the effect of the suspension on his reputation, he said, “I’ve just moved on, man.” Whether Brady is branded as a cheat for conspiring to gain a competitive advantage or as a victim of NFL commissioner Roger Goodell’s broad authority on discipline matters, he has adamantly maintained his innocence, denying that he was, as the investigation said, “generally aware” of a plot to deflate footballs before the 2015 AFC championship game.
The Patriots had professed for a week, as they did Sunday, that this was a normal game, that nothing seemed different, that Brady did not seem at all vengeful, and perhaps that was indeed true. But Brady, with his character and his integrity questioned, cannot be blamed for viewing this season as anything less than an opportunity for a 12-game spree of individual excellence and New England dominance.
Belichick bunker
Leaving the paparazzi for the Belichick bunker, Brady did not speak to the news media at all last week, although his coach expressed reservations cloaked in gamesmanship.
“How do you get ready for the speed of the game when you haven’t been at the speed of the game?” Belichick said last week, when he was in a more voluble mood than he was Sunday. Speaking generally of players who miss time, he added, “Maybe their first game will be the best game, but most likely the third, fourth, fifth, sixth games will probably be better than the first.”
That very well could have been an attempt to temper expectations. But in all likelihood, it was a Belichick ploy. New York Times service
